Research r e ~ o r t no. 86

A

in Africa

The Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, Uppsala 1990

Research report no. 86

Hans Holmbn

State, Cooperatives and Development in Africa

The Scandinavian Institute of African Studies Uppsala 1990

This study is based partly on experiences from the author's field research in Egypt and Jordan, and partly on a literature review. Written sources are in various European languages. Quotations from non-English sources have been translated by the author.

ISSN 0080-6714 ISBN 91-7106-300-5

O The author and the Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1990

Printed in Sweden by Motala Grafiska, Motala 1990

Contents

1. Aim and Scope of the Study Introduction

Objectives Perspectives in Cooperative Research A Note on Development Perspective of the Present Study

2. Cooperation and Development Introduction

A Brief History of Cooperation Cooperation in the Western World Cooperation in Socialist States Early Cooperative Experiences in the Third World 'Schools' and Principles of Cooperation Transferability of Cooperative Ideology

Expectations on Cooperatives as Agents of Change Criticism of Cooperation and Some Comments on the Critique

Cooperatives Bring no Structural Change Cooperatives do not Benefit the Poor Bad Management Government Interference and Hidden Objectives

Concluding Remarks on the Critique of Cooperatives

3. Overdevelopment and Centralization of the Third World State

Introduction Emergence of the Centralized State State and Class in the Third World

Cooperation and Decentralization

4. Summary and Concluding Remarks on the Possibilities for Cooperation and Development 67 Geographical Implications of Organization Building 67 Cooperation Revisited 70 Cooperation and Development Reconsidered 72 Conclusions 76

References 78

1. Aim and Scope of the Study

Cooperation is not an aid-giving business. A.F. Laidlaw

Irrtroduction

Many recipes have been presented to overcome the unsatisfactory situation of the Third World. One of the most widely implemented efforts to speed up development is to organize people in rural cooperative societies. This, however, can be (and has been) done in a great number of ways, from highly diverging starting points, and with very different assumptions about ambitions and possibilities of actors involved.

Cooperation has faced renewed actuality as change agent and develop- ment motor during the last decade's reorientation of development theory (and, to some extent, of practice) towards decentralization, self-help and development 'from below'. An enhanced importance of cooperatives should be based on comprehensive, empirical studies of their potentials, constraints and prerequisites in different settings. So far, to my know- ledge, this has not been done. What can be found is instead a mass of co- operative case studies, policy papers, etc. which, together with other studies, may be used to analyze cooperative experiences and to determine the necessary preconditions for cooperative success.

Experiences from, and expectations on, cooperatives vary and the roles of cooperatives as tools for development naturally differ. This is no wonder since the conditions under which Africa's peasants must toil, and the problems they face, differ greatly, from fully irrigated agriculture ir? the Nile valley to seasonal dry farming, shifting cultivation for subsistence needs, and export oriented plantations in sub-Saharan Africa. Some even stress that peasants' conditions and problems are "as varied, complex and enormous as the continent itself' (Haque F, 1988, p 17). Consequently, it is sometimes argued that any generalization of relations between formal co- operatives and African local communities should be avoided (Hedlund H, 1986). Others go even further, saying that it would be meaningless to try to generalize African cooperative experiences (StAhl I, 1988). No doubt, local variations exist but certain regularities are never theless observable. It is the purpose of this study to investigate these regularities and possibly to explain them.

Objectives

The objective of this study is twofold. First, it aims to summarize and generalize the experiences of efforts to use agricultural cooperatives as instruments of development in Africa. Second, it aims at determining the conditions under which cooperatives can be suitable institutions for en- hancement of development.

These analyses will be made against the background of a discussion of advantages and shortcomings of various perspectives in writings and research about cooperatives and development. This is the theme of chapter one.

Based on a review of literature on development, cooperation and the various actors involved in rural organization building, chapter two illuminates the various expectations placed on cooperatives as change agents. Success and failure of cooperatives is discussed not only in relation to the (real or imagined) nature and characteristics of peasants or peasant societies, but also in relation to the roles and objectives of promoters and 'supervisors' like aid organizations and public administrative bodies.

As African cooperative organizations, more often than not, have been initiated by and closely linked to, the state, the nature of the state apparatus in transitory societies, its impact on development planning, on cooperative design and performance are other matters of analysis. This is all the more important as, paradoxically, "although being widely acknow- ledged as significant, the relation state-cooperatives has apparently not been judged as sufficiently important to attract much systematic, empirical research" (Gyllstrom B, 1988, p 12). This is the theme of chapter three.

Chapter four, finally, summarizes the findings and attempts to deter- mine the necessary preconditions for cooperatives to play an important role in development.

Perspectives in co-operative research

Cooperation, like 'development', is a concept which arouses much emo- tion. Much that has been written about cooperation and development has been made by writers from "within the movement" or belonging to bureaucracies closely related to cooperative organizations. It has often been of a rather uncritical and apologetic nature. Even when studies of cooperation and development have not been hampered by such biases, instead being made by neutral researchers, "there has been an apparent tendency among social scientists towards rather reductionist generali- zations" (Gyllstrom B & Hatti N, 1987, p 7). Apthorpe and Gasper (1982) distinguish between four basic perspectives common in cooperative studies: the immanent, the transcendent, the essentialist, and the instrumentalist perspectives. In short they are characterized as follows:

Immanence. The criteria used are "internal" to the policy or institution itself, i.e. its stated objectives. Organizational self-evaluation=immanent criticism.

Transcendence. An "external" approach that takes its criteria independently of the policy/institution evaluated, without any necessary or overriding reference to the institution's self-conception or implied criteria.

Instrumentalism. Treats particular activities and measures simply as means towards some more general ends; ends without reference to features of particular means. An instrumentalist approach asks rather "wether" than "how".

Essential ism. Contains a particular, usually positive, commitment concerning the matter being evaluated. It tends to advocate a policy/ institution rather than to analyze it critically. Thereby, it is prejudiced and unscientific.

Following Apthorpe and Gasperl, instrumentalism's detachment from particular means leads to a willingness to entertain considerations about, and to be open to, the adoption of a variety of means, including different means in different circumstances -thus, it tends towards situationalism. The danger here, the writers argue, is that everything becomes merely a means towards remote and insufficiently examined abstract ends. With instrumentalism it can be the goals rather than the means to attain them which tend to be seen as not requiring much defence or even close examination. (But what if the ends are thoroughly analyzed and well understood?).

With essentialism the commitment to the valued proper and essential form of the policy or institution is likely to result in the ostensible means being treated this way, the means and the ends having been united in the "true" form of the policy or institution. Essentialism tends to treat unsuccessful examples of the policy/ institution it advocates as not being "true" examples. If institutions created to speed up development fail to do this, the recommended 'cure' is often more of the same, rather than change of approach.

Apthorpe and Gasper reject the transcendent approach because it may take its (external) criteria from a general theory of history which may have been unknown altogether to the policymakers or institution-builders concerned, or from an ideology which would be foreign or hostile to those making and implementing the policy under review. Therefore, it is 'unfair' and should be avoided. (Obviously, a transcendent approach can easily become essentialistic. This, however, cannot be a sufficient reason to reject the transcendent approach per se. On the contrary, it represents 'standard

While the two writers choose one of these approaches as the only "proper" one and dismiss the others, there are obviously limitations and dangers involved in all of them.

7

procedure' in science, i.e. a phenomenon/policy/institution is analyzed in the light of, and compared to, a hypothesis or theory about the 'state of things'. The outcome may be a change of theory or of the institution/ policy under study, or both).

The transcendent approach is then contrasted with the immanent approach to cooperative study. While an essentialist approach can sometimes be seen as an extreme form of immanence, the strength of immanence, Apthorpe and Gasper argue, is derived from the fact that it takes its point of departure in the stated objectives of the policy/ institution investigated. Immanence, they say, is an invaluable tool in identifying bias, since it means examining the consistency and coherence of a position in its own terms. An immanent approach, thus, asks: Which are the stated objectives? To what degree have they been attained? Why, why not? (Ideally, an immanent approach also asks: Which are the alternatives? How have they performed? Which are their degrees of goal-attainment?)

Apthorpe, who was CO-director of the UNRISD-studies which came out as very critical of the performance-and even the suitability-of cooperatives in the Third World (chapter two), maintains (together with Gasper) that the UNRISD-studies were based on an immanent approach, which, he sais, made these studies more scientific than many other studies of cooperation and development. That, however, is only partially correct. While Apthorpe and Gasper underline that "a non-essentialist approach looks at alternatives", they admit that the UNRISD-reports "lacked extensive and direct comparisons of cooperatives with other institutional approaches to rural development". Thus, they only went half-way.

While the UNRISD studies have been subject to massive critique, much of which Apthorpe and Gasper rightly dismiss as essentialistic lamen- tation (see chapter two), there are a number of dangers involved when a strictly immanent approach is applied.

First, all goal-fulfilment evaluation necessarily tends to be biased and produce more or less disappointing results in so far as it is likely that stated objectives will only be partially realized. When the object of inves- tigation is a matter as complicated as developmen t-realiza tion, this tendency is dramatically accentuated. This bias may be tuned down if alternative policies/institutions are investigated in the same place and at the same time from an immanent approach as well-but the bias remains.

Second, while an immanent approach may answer the question "if' and establish some degree of goal-attainment, it does not necessarily reveal "why" stated objectives have not been attained (if that is the case), nor why development has become what it has actually become. Immanence, thus, is too narrow and only insofar as the reasons for success or failure are internal to the organization will an immanent approach suffice. In most cases, to answer such questions, other approaches will be needed which take exogenous factors into consideration. To compare with alterna- tives can help but it is not enough.

Third, stated objectives are not always immanent objectives. With cooperatives it is often the case that their goals and roles have been determined by external actors, usually the state and international aid- agencies, and then they have been superimposed on local societies. These stated goals may conflict with goals desired by members. Apthorpe and Gasper state that the UNRISD-studies "adopted the goals proclaimed by the movements themselves as criteria1' but then they go on to say: "how it was that these goals came to be proclaimed is of course an important ques- tion". It is indeed. But to answer that question it will again be necessary to transcend the immanent approach and to look outside the organization/ institution in question.

Fourth, there is also a conflict between declared and undeclared objectives in policy/institution-evaluation. Development in general and, particularly, the building of development institutions are highly political matters. In the case of cooperatives, goals have generally been set by governments but at times the government's 'hidden objectives' may be as strong as-or even stronger than-the stated objectives. This makes investigations of the fulfilment of only stated goals rather obscure. Con- sequently, the goal-setter itself (its nature, aims and options) must be analyzed and 'hidden objectives1 must be explicitly searched for. Thus, strict adherence to an immanent approach comes out as rather reductionist and, in many cases, will neither answer the questions "why", nor "whereto", which are so essential in development research.

Clearly, it will be impossible to fully explain cooperative performance by solely looking at intra-organizational factors. Cooperatives must be seen in a broader societal framework and in the light of involved actors' interests, positions, resources and restrictions-i.e. from a holistic and transdisciplinary perspective. Furthermore, realizing the political aspects of the building of development-organizations:

political phenomena can best be understood in terms of the total cultural and historical- matrix in which they are set [i.e. within1 an explicit interdisciplinary perspective (Baker RW, 1978, p ix).

To understand the roles, performances, impacts and potentials of coop- eratives (or of any other institution) as development instruments, it is essential that the study goes beyond the immediate focus for investigation. Nothing takes place in isolation and cooperatives are certainly not built in a vacuum. Without explicitly relating them to a wider context, analysis will be of limited value. The need to apply a broader, interdisciplinary perspective is further accentuated by the very complexity of the develop- ment process itself.

A Note on Development

'Development' has many connotations and maybe as many definitions as there are writers on the subject. Usually, it has been associated with economic growth and diffusion of innovations. It has been called 'modern- ization' which, generally, means westernization. Development has been understood as spatial reorganization and as progressive distribution of the good things in life. Development contains all these aspects, but also many others. Eric Jacoby reminds us that 'development'

is not homogenous and balanced, it is not necessarily "development" in any progressive meaning, as professional development theorists like to prove. It is always painful, associated with deteriorating quality of life for large parts of the population, even if it, in a longer perspective, may imply progress for the majority of the people. But the transformation-process is always connected to a re-formulation of values and beliefs (Jacoby E, 1983, p 181).

In essence, development is a conflict-ridden transition of society from one social system and one mode of production to another, and as such it represents a period of anomaly2 without given rules. Development, then, does not simply mean "change", "growth", or increased "efficiency" (efficient for whom?), even if that is its aim. It is a complex and, in part, frustrating process which can not be expected to come about smoothly and without opposition (especially not when implemented and 'controlled' from above and outside).

It is widely recognized that man always, as far as possible, has tried to survive and shape his life according to those experiences that has proved to be most effective. When, for example, food shortages occur, the known mode of production is intensified and not until conditions for life are seriously and permanently deteriorating is he prepared to examine new ways to organize life and production. Karl Marx has shown that a mode of production is not abandoned until its inherent contradictions become so strong that they overwhelm the system and lead to a crisis. Then a new 'progressive' class, representing a more effective resource allocation, takes possession of power, a new era emerges and a new moral order comes into existence (Marx K, edn 1974). Ester Boserup has shown that African subsistence farmers alter production techniques, settlement patterns, etc. in response to augmenting population pressure and deteriorating levels of food production per capita, i.e. as a response to a crisis and not because they vision or have heard about %etter' lifestyles (Boserup E, 1965).

It is perfectly natural that Emile Durkheim (1858-1917) wrote about anomaly at the time when he did. 19th century Europe was passing through a period when old norms and value-systems were disintegrating while no other system had yet emerged in their place.

Likewise, Marvin Harris describes a sequence of population growth - intensification of production-environmental impoverishment. Population growth leads to intensification of the prevailing mode of production which, sooner or later, results in ecological deterioration. To survive this crisis, the culture/society (if large-scale emigration is not possible) is forced to develop, i.e. to transform itself into a more effective mode of production with accompanying alterations in social norms and value systems to legitimate the new system. Harris strongly emphasizes man's disinclination to embark on so far-reaching societal transformations until there is no other choice. This is so not only because it is risky or because of the strength of the old normative system, but also because such transformations always lead to increased social control over the individual (Harris M, 1979).

Thus, it is in the phase of deterioration, when the known social system and the prevailing mode of production reaches its limits and a crisis sets in, that the need for development is more commonly felt. It is in this phase that social norms and value systems loose their meaning and evaporate or have their symbolism changed, making it easier for man to experiment, to seek new solutions to encountered problems; in short to develop.

This means that development (as it is understood here) can hardly be planned. Planning can only be effective within a system, i.e. before the known system reaches its limits or after the transitory phase has been passed through and a new logic prevails. In spite of this, planning, or the engineering of crisis, is exactly what is being tried. This desire for control (intensification) is understandable but its functionality is in doubt.

Thus, apart from expected improvements of material conditions, development-and especially planned development-implies the imposi- tion of a new and alien rationality which, by the potential beneficiaries, may be perceived as immoral. The inevitable cultural uprooting that goes hand in hand with development has provoked not only anti-western sentiments and religious, notably Islamic, 'fundamentalism'3 in large parts of the world. It has also brought forth many other forms of active or passive resistance at local level against development programmes imposed from above. Accomplishing development is thus far from the simple technical matter as which it is often presented.

If these are theoretical objections to the "planning of development", there are practical obstacles to development planning as well. The general

As underlined by Ibrahim, Islamic fundamentalism is primarily a reaction against the conspicuous consumption of the rich, westernized elites, which sharply contrasts to deteriorating living conditions for the masses and reduced social mobility for the educated young (an emerging but frustrated middle class). In spite of its religious symbolism, it is not primarily a religious phenomenon (Ibrahim SE, 1982). Fouad Ajami likewise notes that this is only an apparent resurgence of Islam, in a period when traditions rupture, "when patience wears thin, when people no longer believe" (Ajami F, 1982, p140).

shortage of central financial resources, the common lack of reliable information, and of skilled and devoted personnel to carry the plans out are well-known obstacles to plan-fulfillment in most developing countries. Furthermore, the time needed is generally much longer than what is permitted in most schemes of planned development. To complicate matters, a general experience is further that both international 'de- velopment aid' projects and national development programmes are full of hidden objectives and frequently have been utilized for purposes other than those officially stated. The intricacy of the matter, therefore, demands a comprehensive and holistic approach of study if the process is to be understood in all its complexity. As mentioned above, this is so also when the object under study is not development per se, but institution-building aiming at development promotion (how ever defined in the concrete case).

Usually, such comprehensive approaches have not been adopted in general development studies. The so called 'modernization theories1 of the 1950s and 1960s primarily searched for factors impeding development, internal to the less developed countries themselves (low rates of savings and investments, lack of 'achievement orientation', etc.). 'Dependence theoryf of the 1970s, which primarily was a reaction against the biased modernization school, instead concentrated on external reasons for underdevelopment (international economic structures and the periphery's neo-colonial dependence on the world's political and economic centre). It is understandable that dependence theorists, in their polemics with 'modernizers1, came to stress external relations but in so doing they, as did their opponents, paid attention only to one side of the problem.

One recent example of the risks involved in limiting research about complex processes only to aspects of development is Gillis et al. (1983) who state that "an active and positive role for government is essential" (p 24) for development to 'take off'. But then they find that a great many governments in the Third World are "unable or unwilling to pursue policies that would achieve development" (p 27). While this latter statement is correct, they go on to say: "why governments have found themselves in these situations [is an important question] but the answer to that question would take [the authors] deep into the nature of politics and society in developing nations and would divert [them] from [their] book's main task of explaining (sic!) economic development" (Gillis Met et al. 1983, p 27; my emphasis).

The above example clearly illustrates that such 'diversions' are necessary if development is to be understood or explained at all. As noted by Hagerstrand "our ability to decompose has become far more superior than our ability to put together and place our constructs back into reality" (Hagerstrand T, 1983, p 374). To fit the various pieces of qualitatively different knowledge back into a comprehensive reality calls for inter- disciplinary and holistic approaches (see Andersson S, 1979; Asplund J, 1970; Pohl J, 1986). It needs also to be remembered that "everything which

is present in a (bounded) part of the world has to be recognized as playing a role there" (ibid. p 378). Furthermore, "it is not only what is visible that is taking place, but also what is present" (Hagerstrand T, 1985, p 60. Holism, however, "need not presume that the [researcher] seeks to comprehend a society or system totally ... [but it] assumes a functional connection within a system. Whatever is examined is viewed in relationship to other things of which it is a par r (Nadim W, 1977, p 107).

An inclusion of the nature of politics and society into the analysis of Third World economics would no doubt enhance our understanding of why, and in which historical situations, governments are able or willing to play a positively active role in development, and in which historical situations they are not. Otherwise specialized 'knowledge' risks arriving at superficial conclusions that "certain cultures seem more resistant to change than others4" (ibid. p 30). There are no such things as change-resi- stant or innovative cultures. On the contrary, all cultures tend to resist change during certain historical phases and to be innovative during others. Cultures, thus, are not static but 'culture', nevertheless, must be treated as one among several factors influencing behaviour, development and institution-building. However, to the extent that culture is considered, "to concentrate simply on the question of pre-existing social bonds is wrongly to isolate only one aspect of the problem" (Worsley P, 1971, p 37).

Perspective of the Present Study

Hagerstrand, while advocating the adoption of a spatially limited 'arena perspective', wants to "turn human geography into a study of the conditions for life in a regional setting" (Hagerstrand T, 1975, p 9). He declares that "the core-area of geography is the study of the struggle for power over the admission of existences in time and space" (Hagerstrand T, 1985, p 7). We can use exactly the same expression to define de- velopment. The struggle for power over the admission of existences in time and space is, after all, what development is all about. Development planning is part of this struggle. Planners and planning authorities are not neutral or positioned "above" the contending forces. Likewise, to change the conditions for life in a regional setting is, after all, the ultimate objective for the building of all cooperative (and other) development- institutions. Whether caused by cooperatives or not, the conditions for life change as development proceeds (and, initially, as a prerequisite for its coming about). Some changes and processes emerge from within the arena/organization, some have external causes. Some have consequences only within the arena/ organization. Others also affect the world outside

As the authors explicitly concentrate on economic matters and avoid analysing culture, such conclusions can not be drawn from the material they investigate.

it. The arena is no isolated phenomenon. Neither are development institutions. In many ways they are linked to the rest of the world.

Conflict and competition (and sometimes concensus and cooperation) among actors and interests are essential parts of any development process. Improved positions or extended lebensraum for some actors have positive or negative effects on other actors' positions and possibilities. It is the combined effect of these struggles which explain the performance of the organizations operating on any arena, and which eventually alter the character of the arena itself.

Africa currently passes through an uprooting process of transformation, both physically, socially, economically and politically. Its various characteristics are altered in this process. A certain type of organization, agricultural cooperation, has been introduced to facilitate this develop- ment. Cooperatives are linked to various interests and groups (members, employees, aid agencies, public administrative bodies, political institu- tions). They have been given certain objectives, resources and directives. They operate amidst a mass of external actors (individuals, groups, institutions) with sometimes overlapping, sometimes opposing objectives. Some aim at modernization, others want to preserve what already is. Some aim at greater central control and some at local self-reliance. Constraints, characteristics and interests of these competing/cooperating actors need to be established if we are to understand why and how cooperatives perform as they do, especially if we are to say anything about their potentials as future development instruments.

Figure: Actors influencing the performance ofa local cooperative society

I 8 foreign I I aid-org I

LOCAL CO-OP __L1 I 1

NON CO-OP I DEVELOPMENT 6 ORGANIZATION 1

I I I - - - - - - - -

landuse, production income-distribution, attitudes

2. Cooperation and Development

Introduction

Simply put, cooperative societies, being based on the principles of voluntariness and democratic control, are economic enterprises, owned by their members and pursuing activities for the benefit of their members. Sometimes such undemanding definitions do not seem to suffice and cooperation has been characterized as "economic democracy in action" (ICA, 1978). It is widely held that cooperation is not only a business activity but, primarily, "a way of life" (Hasselmann E, 1971) and "the only form of enterprise that represents an ideology" (Johansson T, 1980), why it is also held to be "a social and cultural liberation movement" (Laidlaw AF, 1981). However, it has also been noted that

a striking feature of cooperation is that both among observers who are outside cooperation, and internally within cooperation, there are a great number of alternative and often contradictory interpretations of cooperative phenomena (Jonnergdrd K, et al. 1984, p 30).

Both this ideological tinge and the lack of agreement about what cooperation really is or aims at, naturally, have farreaching implications for promoting or transferring cooperative organizations to the Third World. A short review of the history and evolution of cooperation in the First and Second Worlds will therefore serve as a necessary foundation for a discussion of the principles of cooperation, its meaning and 'ethos1, not to mention the suitability of cooperatives as development tools for the Third World.

A Brief History of Cooperation

Cooperation in the Western World

Some authors find great pleasure in trying to locate the roots of formal cooperation as far back in history as possible. Thus it is argued that "cooperative genealogy ... can be traced back to thirteenth century Swiss cheese-makers" (Young C, et al. 1981, p 3). Others search for the cooper- ative origin in a far more distant past and, for example, Adnan Abeidat

claims that "as long as ca. 3000 BC. cooperative guilds were formed by craftsmen in ancient Egypt" (Abeidat A, 1975, p 3).

As a significant institution cooperation dates from the mid-19th century and was born in the multiple disruption of society during early industrialization. It was a movement of emancipation and of spontaneous origin. Together with other popular movements of the time, like emerging labour movements, liberalism and socialism, cooperation was a symptom of the turbulent process of societal transformation. It was largely a reaction against the expanding urban-capitalist society which not only brought hardship and poverty to the masses but also, in Tonnies' words, transformed human relations from Gemeinschaft to those of Gesellschaft. In short, cooperative associations originated in a situation that in many ways resembles that of today's Third World. However, while the spread of early European cooperative ideas and examples was facilitated by economic liberalization, only a few contemporary 'developing' nations are characterizes by a liberal political and economic climate.

In part, the cooperative idea was founded on an ideological heritage from 'utopian colonies' and ecological communities established in the USA in the early 1800s, from philantropists like Robert Owen and 'utopian socialists' like Saint Simon and Charles Fourier. During its initial stages, then, cooperation contained an outspoken critical view of society. Several shortlived experiments in cooperative and/or collective organization and community-building were made in order to realize "another develop- ment". Capitalism's continued expansion made it necessary to further profilate and articulate the ideas of cooperation but now, however, this was done from within the system and emphasis shifted from political visions to business activity.

As the 'true beginning' of what is commonly known as the cooperative movement is usually understood the establishment of the credit and consumption society in Rochdale, England, in 1844. The Rochdale society was a self-help association without revolutionary aspirations (Hasselmann E, 1971). It was no longer a vision of a new society that forced the members to found a cooperative, as during the days of Robert Owen, and there was no cooperative declaration. But the cooperative was still based on the principles of self-reliance and democracy and four basic principles from Owen were accepted by the Rochdale founders, namely:

- Sales only of pure and clean goods. - Collection of a surplus. - Refunds in proportion to the use made of cooperative services. - Acceptance of a limited interest on invested capital (ibid.).

Strict rules of equity among members were maintained and the economic enterprise was founded upon the principles of democracy, mutual help and responsibility. Although the Rochdale society faced some difficulties

due to negative treatment from private merchants and public authorities, it managed to provide members with higher quality goods at competitive prices. The Rochdale society has later become the model for the consumer cooperatives in the first place, but its governing principles have also guided the cooperative ideal as such.

As modern phenomena, cooperatives, thus, originated in England, at mid-19th century5, primarily in urban consumer retail enterprises. As rural institutions cooperatives first spread, in the late 19th century, in northern Europe (Scandinavia and Germany) and the German philantropist Raiffeissen is maybe the most renumerable name from that time. For the farmers, cooperatives provided an alternative to exploiting intermediaries tied to the hostile urban world. Raiffeissen-societies were based on the principles of neighbourhood and members' unlimited economic responsibility. The difference is therefore great between the Raiffeissen rural neighbourhood society and the Rochdale consumer society, aiming at expansion of activities and enlargement of membership, and with limited members' liability. The Raiffeissen model has later been looked upon as the ideal form for spreading cooperation to the largely ag- ricultural economies in the Third World (Laidlaw AF, 1981). Rochdale, however, has had the greatest influence on cooperative principles and ethos.

In the Western world the emergence of cooperatives as means for self- help was caused by a societal crisis and, in their various forms, constituted reactions against expanding capitalism but within the system. It is said that formal cooperation was a sign of emerging class-consciousness among peasants and workers as

this new spontaneous form of cooperation was made possible by the absence of strong social ties based on kinship. The nuclear family system had already been sufficiently established to make the peasants realize that their strongest allies were not their relatives but the other peasants who shared the same economic fate (Hyden G, 1970, p 64).

However, social democrats and socialists frequently criticized cooperation for "weakening the workers' class consciousness" and representing an "antiquated charlatan culture" (Andersson NR, et al. 1978, p 25). Neither was it uncommon for liberals to hold leading positions in cooperative organizations. This antipathy from the socialist side was caused by some cooperators' frequent agitation against excessive nationalizations and propagation of cooperation as an alternative to state-ownership of the

51, the 1820s, 20 years before Rochdale, state prisoners, sentenced to hard labour and exi- le in Siberia, founded a society with statutes similar in many respects to those of the Rochdale Pioneers. This society was, in the 1830s, given a more formal structure and was turned into a collective enterprise, actually based on Robert Owen's writings (ICA, 1980).

means of production (ibid.). What was at stake, however, was not only workers' solidarity but, primarily, local influence. It was understood that both large-scale private enterprise and state-ownership would result in remote control.

The late 19th and early 20th centuries were also the time when basic education spread, thus facilitating the spread of ideas, accounting skills and other prerequisites for formal organization. Despite the fact that the activities of early cooperative associations often were complicated by narrow legal restrictions, adversely affecting member recruitment (see Hasselmann E, 1971, about England, and Bjarsdal J, 1980, about Sweden), this period was also one of general democratization of society and the abolition of former economic and trade privileges. Not only was this a time of rising class consciousness and workers' agitation for extended civil rights, but also a time when the upper strata in society searched for new ways to organize their economic activities, a factor that left niches open for cooperative (and other) experiments by less fortunate peasants and workers. Partly, it was believed that cooperation, representing a democratic alternative, would preserve the near or intimate relations between people said to characterize small-scale, pre-capitalist communities. Tonnies (1912) thus, explained the attraction of cooperation in the following manner:

The legal form of cooperatives is based on the principle of limited liability and thus follows the pattern of the stock company, ... it is evident that, under a form adapted to conditions of Gesellschaft, there has been revived a vrincivle of Gemeinschaft economy which is capable bf further significant developkent i~ijnnies F, edn 1963, p 196).

As capitalism matured, cooperative enterprises were forced to adjust to its compelling demands and no longer came to represent alternative principles of economic association. The (presumed) Gemeinschaft character of cooperation gradually gave way to Gesellschaft relations, and "the movement ... accepted the existing private-capitalistic market economy and conceived itself [merely] as a corrective within that framework" (Blomquist K, 1981, p 51). Economic, managerial and spatial concentration has characterized cooperative associations in the West. This has, for example, been the case with Swedish farmers' cooperatives with far-reaching consequences both for "the number of elected representatives and in the distance between the member and the society management" (Johansson T, 1980, p 133). Critics of modern cooperation have noted that "technocrats and bureaucrats have had too much influence, [and that] production and distribution have been determined by what is technically possible, not by peoples' needs" (Andersson NR, et al. 1978, p 123). Such experiences of cooperative 'degeneration' throughout the industrialized Western world are summed up by Young et al.:

A life cycle is clearly discernible in the well-established cooperative of the industrial world. In the beginning, a burst of moral energy was captured by the new institutions. Cooperation was a solidary riposte to the predatory forms of the capitalist economy. ... Participation in the early phase was high: the mundane execution of economic tasks is invested with purpose. However, once successfully launched, the very effectiveness of the cooperatives in filling an economic niche creates a new set of imperatives. To survive, the cooperative must become efficient. ... While cooperation is an ethos, effi- ciency is the incubator of technocracy. ... The implications of this simple fact are many. As cooperatives achieved a certain scale, they could no longer be directly managed by their members, but had to hire specialized managerial staff. Armed with the efficiency criterion, the managerial cadres tended to enlarge their role, while the representative organs of the cooperative tended to atrophy; the 'iron law of oligarchy', detected by Robert Michels in labour unions and socialist parties had its analogues in the cooperatives. As cooperatives became institutionalized, they became primarily economic agencies operated by specialized managers under the discipline of the market, with effective member participation only a residual phenomenon, and the matrix of cooperative principles a mere theoretical penumbra (Young C, et al. 1981, p 8f).

As mentioned, Western cooperatives emerged in response to a crisis, as one among several forms of adjustment to societal transformation. Looking at the ups and downs of the popularity of the cooperative ideal "the connection between cooperation and crises is well established" (Johansson T, 1981, pp 24/47). Thus has been found a covariation between periods of economic recession and the setting up of new cooperatives. While the established large-scale cooperative organizations have come to function as any other big company, the cooperative 'ethos', the vision of an alternative development, and the idea of cooperatives as self-help instruments, have survived outside these gigantic enterprises. For example, in both Denmark and Norway, "smallholders have formed their own organizations, parallel to the general ones. In Sweden, there have been attempts to do the same, but they have never resulted in anything of importance" (Bjarsdal J, 1980, p 76).

The industrialized Western world is presently facing a new crisis, manifested i.a. in severe human alienation (Braverman H, 1980), cultural uprootedness, absence of stable value systems (Lasch C, 1981), and severe environmental pollution, threatening future human survival. Eventually, the inherent contradictions of the capitalist mode of production are over- whelming the system. Unorthodox solutions to these problems must be found and

In a world of tired private-capitalism and petrified state-socialism, people search for other modes of organizing the economy. Cooperation attracts growing interest and is sometimes talked about as the third way. More and more people also ask themselves whether the existing cooperative organizations to any significant degree can contri- bute to the solution of these countries' problems (Blomqvist K, 1981, p 51).

Again can be found an inscipient alternative 'movement', most readily observed in the environmentalists' appearance as political pressure groups and as official actors on the political arena in a number of European countries. Emphasis is here on small-scale production, local self- determination, conviviality, Gemeinschaft and acceptance of ecological limits to civilization. In this not yet matured political program, defined as neither left nor right, communal and cooperative associations are given prominent roles in shaping the new society (Gorz A, 1982; Illich I, 1982; Schurnacher EF, 1981).

Again can be observed the founding of new cooperative societies from below in the fields of production, housing and services (see, for example, Defourny J, 1983, on workers' cooperatives in Belgium; and Klugman D, 1983, on alternative cooperatives in the USA). Sometimes, such new cooperative societies have accepted limits to their own growth. In order to guarantee continued member influence, the by-laws of some such societies stipulate that they shall split into two cooperatives when their number of members reaches a predetermined ceiling.

Whether a "new world" will be the outcome of this reaction or not- and whether, in that case, that will be a cooperative society-remains yet to be seen. Demands are presently raised about legal restrictions on production and technology as well as on consumption and waste disposal, in order to reestablish ecological balance. However, there is also a growing fear that enforced recirculation of materials and ecological restrictions on production, "to become a practical possibility, will bring forth firm societal control", and lead to a "totalitarian and corporative" society (Hoffmeyer J, 1984).

Cooperation in Socialist States

Beginning in Russia in the early 20th century, cooperatives, quite differently conceived, became instruments for imposing a socialist, collectivized and centralized mode of agricultural production upon the peasantry. While socialists initially rejected the idea of cooperation as bourgeois, they later found it perfectly compatible with the socialist doctrine. For example, Lenin (1923) denounced cooperation as "huckster- like" and declared that it was "a collective capitalist institution". After the October revolution, however, Lenin assigned to cooperatives a totally unique importance, stating that "socialism will reach its goal by itself if the population to the greatest possible extent is cooperatively organized" (Lenin VI, edn 1975).

Whether Sovjet and East European cooperatives should actually be called cooperatives is, due to extreme state-control, a matter of debate. In any case, they have been accepted as members of the International Cooperative Alliance (ICA). The Sovjet strategy of agricultural develop- ment has been to treat agricultural production units (cooperatives and

state-farms) as "large rural industries" (Hettne B, 1973), led by centrally appointed managers with the purpose to extract a surplus from agri- culture in order to finance industrial investments. The kolchoses produce according to central plans over which peasants have minimal influence. The excessive size, the paternalistic management style and bureaucratic control of Sovjet agricultural cooperatives, have resulted in low productivity, in black markets and wasteful utilization of resources (Hedlund S, 1983).

Thus, also in non-capitalist industrialized nations cooperation soon diverted from its original 'ethos'. In both cases, but for different reasons, cooperatives fitted (or were forced to fit) into larger socio-economic systems, the development of which they were not able or permitted to direct.

Currently, also the East European nations have reached a state of crisis. The centralized and bureaucratized version of socialism in the Sovjet Union and its dependent nations faces, and (in some cases) openly admits, a range of severe shortcomings. Efforts are being made to come to terms with nepotism, corruption and black markets. Both the productive and di- stributive systems are deemed inadequate. Industrial modernization lags behind that of the Western economies and environmental pollution has reached even more acute levels (Anderberg S, 1988). Sovjet self-sufficiency on foodstuffs remains unacceptably low despite repeated efforts of modernization and reclamation of new land. As part of the contemporary attempts to correct and liberate the system, perestrojka, the future role of cooperatives is a matter of intense debate. Possibly, promotion of independent, member-oriented, small-scale cooperatives will be relied upon as part of the solution to the present situation.

Early Cooperative Experiences in the Third World

Early cooperation faced yet another experience, quite different from that of its 'modern' setting. In many colonies cooperatives were introduced by the colonial powers with the purpose either to aid European settlers or to drag the natives into the, externally controlled, monetized economy where they could easier be taxed and made produce for the export markets. Whatever the local expressions of colonialism were, the purpose of colonialism was nowhere to spread capitalism, market relations or "free enterprise" to the native populations. Instead was introduced a system of politically controlled production and economy. As far as the natives were concerned, not much attention was paid to the voluntary and democratic aspects of cooperation. On the contrary, cooperation in the colonies was strongly flavoured by the pervasive paternalism of foreign rule. Moreover, power over local cooperatives was often captured by, or given to, loyalistic elites, enabling them to convert cooperative assets into supplementary resources and to establish themselves as private

moneylenders. "By allowing such abuse the colonial powers, however, succeeded in securing necessary allies in the colonies' rural areas" (Gyllstrom B, 1984, p 2). Differences were great, however, between the ways cooperatives were introduced and managed in those areas controlled by different external powers.

In Portuguese Africa 'native' cooperatives never became prominent instruments for control or for extraction of agricultural surplus. Portugal, with its limited administrative capacity, gave priority to procuring land and labour for the mining and plantation companies (in Guinea Bissau, Angola and Mocambique), and made few attempts to improve or commercialize peasant agriculture (Gyllstrom B, 1988).

In order to increase agricultural production in French West and Equatorial Africa, so called 'Native Provident Societies', Socie'te's Indigtnes de Privoyance, were established at village level, together with tax and labour obligations. As peasants failed to join these societies, membership was made compulsory for every head of household. The social and economic roles of such 'cooperatives', however, remained limited and their main impact was probably the perpetuation of social inequalities (ibid.). Not surprisingly, the French approach to cooperation in West and Sub-Saharan Africa resulted in the development among the native population of a "general mistrust of government aid, specifically the application of cooperative methods" (Young C, et al. 1981, p 9).

As a contrast, it has been held that, in Anglophone Africa, introduction of cooperatives during colonial rule went "relatively good" (van Dooren P, 1982). This is a remarkable statement since "in Kenya and Northern and Southern Rhodesia (Zambia and Zimbabwe), the expansion of coop- eratives was affected by substantial white settler communities and the protection of their particular interests". (Gyllstrom B, 1988, p 4). Africans were barred from membership until after the second world war, but even then only small groups of 'progressive farmers' had access to credit and the cooperatives remained tools for settlers and colonial administrators (Ncube P & Aulakh H, 1986; Ndlela DB, 1981).

Similar experiences were made in French North Africa (Algeria, Tunisia, Marocco) where cooperatives were introduced by the French colons in the early 1900s. Until the early 1960s, these cooperatives were more or less restricted to settlers' agriculture. For the natives were created strictly controlled Societes de Prevoyance with predetermined crop programmes and marketing monopolies (Flores XA, 1969; von Muralt J, 1969).

Some exceptions to this pattern were found in different parts of Africa. Relatively self-reliant 'modern' cooperatives were found in Nigeria and Mauritius (Hanel A, 1986). In Egypt indigenous cooperatives were established as part of the anticolonial struggle in the early 1900s. They survived governmental opposition but did not become important for modernizing agriculture until after 1950 (Holmen H, 1989). In Ghana, where Africans were used to commodity trade, indigenous cooperatives

engaging in cocoa transport and marketing developed during the 1920s. They suffered continued efforts from the colonial government to convert these grass-roots' organizations into controlled formal institutions. In spite of preferential pricing for British traders (especially after the 'cocoa holdup' in 1937-38) it has been stated that peasants managed to wrest control of cooperatives from the colonial administration, and then to use this administration to serve their own ends (Young C et al. 1981). This, however, seems to be an exaggeration. But it is true that a limited freedom was maintained until the second world war (Beckman B, 1976; Gunnars- son C, 1978).

In the aftermath of decolonization, many newly independent nations of the Third World saw in cooperation a multi-purpose vehicle for achieving a broad array of national objectives. For quite a number of these young nations, the attraction of cooperation lay partly in the belief that, by emphasizing solidarity, cooperatives would provide a link between tradition and modernity, preserve Gemeinshaft, and minimize social costs of development. Partly, the attraction lay also in the compatibility of cooperation with a broad anti-capitalist perspective. Cooperation also fitted well into the conventional development thinking in the indus- trialized world at that time which, implicitly or explicitly, assigned the state a leading role as initiator of development and economic growth. As the State's financial resources generally were rather meagre, capital mobilization through cooperatives would help to solve this problem at the same time as cooperatives were expected to ease the administrative burden of the State (Young C et al. 1981).

Many newly independent nations define(d) themselves as "African Socialist" or "Arab Socialist" states. In such countries (for example Algeria, Egypt, Ghana, Tanzania, Tunisia, Zimbabwe) cooperatives have been given prominent roles as instruments both for direction of production and ideological mobilization of the population. During the 'cold' 1950s, therefore, Western powers often looked with suspicion at ambitions to use cooperatives as rural change agents as these were asso- ciated with socialism. During the 1960s, however, Western powers began to see cooperatives as "perfectly compatible with the maintenance of private property" and they became quite acceptable to international development agencies, now treating cooperatives as "neither socialistic nor redistributive" and more important "in the sphere of marketing than in the sphere of production" (Worsley P, 1984, p 147; see also Holdcroft, 1982, about changing emphasis away from 'community development1

towards cooperation and the 'green revolution'). What was implied by this newborn interest in cooperatives as instru-

ments for development? Which type of organization was it that was to be introduced to the developing nations? Which is the ideology behind cooperation? To answer these questions we need to take a closer look at the principles (said to be) governing cooperative activity and 'ethos'.

'Schools' and Principles of Cooperation

The umbrella term 'cooperation' covers a wide range of particular forms, experiences and objectives. Cooperatives in different parts of the world have diverted from the declared cooperative principles in various directions. Instead of talking about the cooperative theory, it therefore seems more accurate to talk about theories of cooperation. Laidlaw (1978) identifies four main schools of cooperative thought:

The cooperative commonwealth school, maintains that the cooperative movement should aim to embrace all fields and permeate all activities of life until it becomes an all-inclusive system.

The school of modified capitalism claims that cooperation is essentially capitalist, but with a different set of rules which serve to restrain the capitalist system and to curb its excesses.

The socialist school believes that cooperatives are essentially socialist institutions. They are public rather than private institutions, or junior partners of the State in centrally planned, socialist economies.

The cooperative sector school, finally, views cooperatives as constituting a distinct economic sector in their own right, essentially different from both capitalism and public enterprise, but with some features of one and certain features of the other (Laidlaw AF, 1978, p 60f).

In spite of such highly diverging ideological and theoretical per- spectives, these different 'schools' refer to the same set of 'basic cooperative principles'. There has, however, been an endless debate over these principles. While the cooperative 'movement' dates back to the first half of the 19th century, it took almost one hundred years, from the founding of the Rochdale society in 1844 to the ICA congress in Paris in 1937, until the first official ratification of these principles. They were then:

- Open membership. - Democratic administration (one member--one vote). - Distribution of surplus in relation to the extent members make use of the

society's business activities.

- Limited interest on share capital. - Political and religious neutrality. - Payments in cash. - Promotion of education.

However, these principles were by no means undisputed and the debate about their formulation remained intense. Above all, it concerned the role of the state and the question of neutrality in political and religious matters (Hasselmann E, 1971). In 1966, the ICA accepted a renewed version of what has since commonly been referred to as the "international coop- erative principles":

- Voluntary membership without artificial restriction or discrimination. - Democratic administration (one member--one vote) and control. - Limited interest, if any, on share capital. - Surplus, if any, should be distributed in an equitable manner in pro-

portion to the members' transactions. - Promotion of education. - Cooperation with other cooperatives at local, national and international

levels (ibid .).

As the most fundamental difference between cooperation and other 'modern' forms for economic organization remains the relation man- capital. In cooperative organizations man is superior to capital (one member--one vote), while in joint stock companies capital is superior to man (influence being proportionate to the number of shares owned).

Equally important is that, in this new catalogue of basic cooperative principles, the principle of neutrality has been left out and the relation between cooperatives and the state has not been resolved. At the same time, a new principle of international and 'movement to movement' cooperation has been added to the list. ICA has become an international apex organization for, at least, two basically different cooperative systems, the Western liberal and the Eastern socialist, and for a number of schools of coop- erative ideology. This has, on the one hand, increased ICA's numerical strength and opened up new possibilities for trips abroad and inter- national careers for top cooperative representatives. On the other hand, it has become increasingly obscure what is really meant by the term co- operation. This, naturally, has implications for the transfer to, or pro- motion of, cooperation in the Third World.

In order to reduce the weight of ideology and to avoid the cultural bias inherent in export of organizational principles, the ILO has formulated an alternative, more relaxed, definition of cooperation which does not attempt to define cooperative societies by a list of predetermined prin- ciples and practices. ILO's recommendation No. 127/1966 thus states that a cooperative society is:

an association of persons who have voluntarily joined together to achieve a common end through the formation of a democratically controlled organization, making equitable contributions to the capital required and accepting a fair share of the risks and benefits of the undertaking in which the members actively participate (ILO, 1966).

Transferability of Cooperative Ideology.

This attempt to emphasize business activities and to reduce the ideological element in cooperatives has, however, not yet solved the problem. As late as in the mid-1980s it was thus stressed that, in developing the Third World,

cooperation ... has normative connotations. It is a movement of social reform and implies a restructuring of society along lines consistent with cooperative ideology (Verhagen K, 1984, p 18).

Nevertheless, cooperatives are sometimes promoted with the sole purpose to spread technical innovations without being tinged by ideological objectives from the promoters' side. It has often been witnessed that technology transfer is a highly problematic matter. However, even when technicality is thought to supersede ideology, "undifferentiated transfers of institutions and organizations is no less problematic than transfers of production techniques" (Kotter H, 1984) and ideology reenters the question of technical modernization.

From a 'technical' point of view, Puri underlines that in Third World rural districts many of the conventional Western tenets cease to be functional. For example, the time-honoured cooperative principle of patronage refund is not so meaningful in agricultural credit societies where the patronage of members is primarily by way of borrowing from the society. Likewise, the so called principle of cash sales, derived from European consumer cooperatives, is not applicable to agricultural supply cooperatives in an African or Asian context where credit is the greatest need (Puri SS, 1979, pp 26-29). But matters like these soon lead to more far- reaching ideological considerations. For example, the question of credit "is often considered a technical question, maybe because of the technicality of the details. But it ... is one of the basic decisions about the kind of rural society that is going to be created (Widstrand CG, 1970, p 15f). Not only Western promoters of cooperation in the Third World stress the im- portance of ideology. Puri sais that because the cooperative movements in the Third World are generally new, they have not yet degenerated and the focus of the debate has not yet shifted to 'operational' problems as in the Western world. Consequently, he sais, "the leaders of cooperative move- ments in non-European countries are often inclined to look upon ideology as constituting the core of cooperation" (Puri SS, 1979, p 23; my emphasis). Puri, no doubt is correct in this observation but the reasons are likely to be others than those he brings forth. The question is which, or whose, ideology it is that shall be allowed to govern these cooperative move- ments, that of 'specialists' and national political leaders or that of the peasants6?

h most European languages 'peasant' has a negative ring and is often used as an insult. Nevertheless, the concept peasant is frequent in development literature. Here it is used, as suggested by Andersson (19851, "to define a general empirical category of agricultural producers". Development literature commonly differentiates between "primitive cultivators", "peasants" and "farmers" but, as noted by Andersson, the problem with "peasant" is that, even in common English, it has pseudo-scientific signification, not only separating "peasants" from (capitalist) "farmers" on the one hand, and from (primitive)

Cooperatives are self-help institutions. They are also promoted in/transferred to non-Western settings as change agents. To the extent that emphasis is laid on change, it is widely held that 'traditional' peasants, for a number of reasons, lack 'achievement orientation' and are incapable of bringing forth the necessary, progressive adjustments of life and pro- duction. A world-wide and age-old (urban) view of peasants and peasant societies depicts them as fatalistic, risk-avoiding, conservative or hostile to change (Barke M & O'Hare G, 1984; Mabogunje A, 1980). Some writers maintain that "especially during the mid-1950s and early 1960sV, development experts and international advisers blamed agricultural development problems on "bad extension ... lack of skilled personal, and ... the poor economic attitudes of peasants" (Long N, 1980, p 146). The obvious cure for such problems was: more control, more education and more experts. However, this view of the inadequacy of peasants did not quite disappear in the late 1960s as suggested above. Big, influential development institutions like the UN and the World Bank still see cooperatives as instruments for "mass-transfer" of external innovations (UN 1970, 1974) and "delivery systems" for large scale projects (Kirsch 0 et al. 1980).

Not only is the traditional peasant culture often presented as stagnant but, particularly, as anti-cooperative. 20 years ago it was thus noted that it is "the traditional structure of African society, which constitutes the endogenous obstacle to cooperative penetration" (Flores XA, 1969, p 229). Views like these were fairly common in the 1970s. Although they have since met considerable opposition, they are still influential. Hydkn for example, not only explains cooperative shortcomings but subSaharan development problems in general by reference to an "uncaptured peasantry" tied to a traditional and parochial "economy of affection", impeding any progressive adjustment (Hyden G, 1983). In fact, Hydkn is apt to explain virtually all Africa's development problems as being caused by "the anomaly of the African peasantry" (Hydkn G, 1986). (For a critique of Hydbn and such sweeping generalizations about cooperatives and development in Africa, see, for example, Hedlund H, 1986, pp 10-20).

In other African regions where peasants long have been 'captured', i.e. their surplus has been appropriated by higher classes, and where it has not been possible to escape into the bush, notably in Egypt, exploitation

"cultivators" on the other. As the agricultural producers in the Anglo-Saxon world by de- finition are "farmers", the different terms seem, partly at least, to be motivated more by ethnocentricity than by love of precision. The same idiosyncrasy is usually not found in other languages. A French paysan is synonymous to cultivateur and agriculteur, meaning 'a person from the countryside who tills the soil'. The Arabic term fellah covers both "farmef', "peasant" and "cultivator". The Swedish terms lanfbrukure and jordbrukure are both broad but more technical than the term bonde which, at the most, has social and political undertones and a historical loading from the past, when it equaled the Swedish rural population (Andersson C, 1985, p 7f).

and oppression has forced peasants-but for completely different reasons-to seek (limited) refuge in an 'economy of affection1 (Wittfogel KA, 1957). Also in such stratified social environments peasants are said to display "lack of self-help initiatives" (El Menoufi K, 1982) and it has been questioned whether in societies with a hydrualic' heritage "cooperative development can be brought about at all" (Kirsch 0,1977, p 263).

Peasants' anti-cooperative and anti-developmental attitudes, it is maintained, are further enhanced by religion (von Muralt J, 1969; de Planhol X, 1979; Treydte KP, 1971) and by 'culture1 in general (Gillis M et al. 1983) or specifically (Patai R, 1973). For a number of reasons, therefore, cooperatives have not been expected to emerge from within peasant communities. Despite the fact that Western writers on cooperation often like to underline that early European cooperation was "a direct continuation of the popular forms for mutual economic aid that were found in the pre-industrial society" (Johansson T, 1981, p 17), the various institutions for mutual aid that have been found in Africa are often not reckoned to have the same potentials. On the contrary, it is frequently underlined that

traditional and informal kinds of cooperation are not at all the same as formal cooperation ... and the latter does not necessarily evolve from the former (Laidlaw AF, 1978, p 71).

[and] entirely new concepts of financial management and technical and administrative effectiveness have to be imparted to villagers if the group approach is to be successful (Lele U, 1978, p 43).

However, it would not be correct to claim that there is a general concensus that peasants are always and everywhere tradition-bound and hostile to change. Many scholars do conceive peasants as rational beings (we will return to some of them below). It is easy to understand why urban-based technocrats and representatives of the central authority so often maintain this paternalistic attitude. But the point I want to make is that surprisingly many development theorists (for example, Hyden, Mabogunje), regional 'experts' (Mayfield) and even such influential aid- and development- organizations as the UN still maintain this view.

No doubt, peasants and rural communities all over Africa lack much that would facilitate development (skills, financial resources, contacts, knowledge), but maybe what they lack most is incentives. Rather than displaying a general hostility towards development, there are natural reasons why peasants often have been found suspicious of outsiders and officials (Weitz R, 1971; Wolf EA, 1971). As pointed out by Worsley, "peasants are always dominated by outsiders; economically, politically, and culturally, they are underdogs" Worsley P, 1984, p 72). Consequently, they are keen to know the price of development and to maintain as much

self-reliance as they can in the process of modernization. This has spread the stereotype of peasants as being

cunning, secretive, hidebound by tradition, lacking in enterprise or effort, and probably concealing the wealth they had in their socks and mattresses, and hiding their real hostility behind a mask of deference. Overall, they are untrustworthy, incomprehensible, even irrational (ibid, p 120f).

Although there is presently a considerable number of researchers expressing more favourable opinions about peasant abilities, such reasoning served to legitimate external interference and outside control of aid projects. It also served to justify the creation of large, centralized planning and development authorities. Later on "in many instances [i tl served those responsible as a kind of justification for the failure to achieve the ends sought" (Weitz R, 1971, p 70).

The matter of cooperative ideology seems largely to be a question of levels. It may very well be that cooperative ideology is a subject of high priority among international experts, cooperative leaders, national planners and politicians who vision a type of society that, presumably, is to be created by building cooperative organizations. Such considerations, however, seem largely to be limited to this elite and, generally, ideological discussions among ordinary members are avoided, hindered or even prohibited. Members, on the other hand, are more interested in material goods and technical innovations (Migot-Adholla SE, 1970), and less concerned with ideology.

Expectations on Cooperatives as Agents of Change

Despite the somewhat diffuse conceptualization of cooperation, but strengthened both by the vision of peasant fatalism and by the planning euforia that prevailed during the 1950s and 1960s, expectations about the roles and potentials of cooperatives as development instruments have been both varied and far-reaching, to say the least. From comparatively 'humble' notions of the "fundamental importance of cooperation as a means to solve the problems of agriculture and food-supply" in the Third World (Bonow M, 1969, p 207 ), expectations range all the way to realizationof the cooperative doctrine (Verhagen K, 1984), and the recreation of a social community that tends to disappear in the process of development (Hirschfeld A, 1978). Others state that "a good number of experts" always have considered cooperation "the most valid of the solutions for the Third World and its problems" (Konopnicki M, 1978, p 7). Thus, it is held that cooperatives can, "theoretically and in the long run, resolve most if not all problems of development" (ICA, 1978).

In more 'down to earth' terms, promotion of cooperative organizations in developing countries is expected to:

- Increase agricultural production through the pooling of resources and introduction of modern farming techniques.

- Extend the supply of credit and agricultural inputs, as well as the marketing of produce, thereby linking producers to markets, reducing overhead costs and eliminating exploiting middlemen.

- Cater for the poor and minimize social stratification. - Establish "cooperative awareness" among members.

Here, it is a question of parallel objectives which interlock and overlap. It is not seen as possible to realize one if the others are neglected. Naturally, priorities differ both in time and space but cooperation, it is generally argued, is--or should b e a broad attack on several front-lines at the same time.

The prevailing systems of credit distribution (availability) in large parts of the Third World are generally seen as one of the most severe obstacles to development.7 High interest rates on loans together with insecure and confiscatory tenancy regulations deprive small farmers of all incentives to modernize. Provision of cheap and secure credit to smallholders is therefore usually seen as maybe the most important aspect of cooperative activity. Better-off farmers, it is argued, are in no need for such credit and, therefore, cooperatives do not attract them. This would minimize the risk that rich farmers should dominate local cooperative societies. Conse- quently, it is maintained, cooperatives will mainly benefit the middle and lower strata of the rural community, thereby enhancing their competitive power. Thus, it is held, "cooperation is typically a movement of small farmers" (Young C et al. 1981; see also Worsley P, 1967,1984). In case local cooperatives become dominated by the better off, "a greater degree of involvement by donors [is recommended] to ensure that the benefits of aid actually reach the poor". Also is suggested the setting up of special coope- ratives for "the rural poor themselves" (COPAC, 1978, pp 7-12). We will return to the matter of cooperative credit below.

As another guarantee against old influential groups or patrons misusing the cooperative for their own benefit is usually seen the principle of democratic rule. The mass of small peasants is thought to outnumber the few wealthy farmers. However, democratic rule presupposes active participation in cooperative meetings and decision making, not only in economic affairs. Participation, in turn, presupposes knowledge and understanding of cooperation, small business administration, etc. and some sense of common interest based on horizontal solidarity. Con- sequently, member education and creation of "cooperative awareness"

7 ~ h i l e this is more relevant in an Asian or Latin American context than in Africa south of the Sahara, it is valid also in North Africa and the Middle East.

constitutes another objective usually seen as the most important task for cooperative organizations.

Provision of credit and agricultural inputs, as well as introduction of modern farming techniques and educational programmes are generally seen as parts of comprehensive, national development schemes. Particularly when constituting parts of a larger package including general, infrastructural development. A representative argument is that

... three conditions emerge that must be fulfilled for the community cooperative organization to succeed in its role as a representative of the farmer's interests. First, it must be recognized and supported in this role by all the institutions and agencies, government, public and private, that supply agricultural services to the farmer. Second, it must be all inclusive-that is, it must cover all those service activities that are essential for the farmer managing a conventional farm ... Third, it must be recognized by all members of the community as the determining organizational body in all spheres of activity (Weitz R, 1971, p 101; my emphasis).

We can trace a mixture of two somewhat contradictory strands of ideology in policies aiming at realizing development by means of cooperative organization building. One emphasizes development from below, learning by doing, local self-reliance, mutual aid, the pooling of resources in voluntary organizations, and a 'healthy independence from government'. The other emphasizes planned development. In the latter case, peripheral areas are integrated into the nation through long-term social and economic development schemes. Government assistance is here seen as a necessary precondition for the success of rural cooperatives and education can only be provided by those already 'modern' and 'enlightened'.

Combined, the various expectations on cooperatives add up to a rather shattered view of their role in development. Not all objectives are consistent. Consequently, cooperative implementation has been problematic and is partly to blame for the limited results of rural development efforts in poor nations. The performance and suitability of cooperatives, as well as the entire idea of using cooperatives as development instruments, have, particularly during the last decade, been severely criticized, and sometimes rejected all-together.

Criticism of Cooperatives and some Comments on the Critique

Experiences from cooperatives in the Third World differ and the records of cooperation are mixed and uneven. This is so not only from one country to another, but also from one region to another within the same country. However, many Third World cooperative organizations also share a good number of common experiences and development patterns. Based on these, some general, and quite negative, conclusions have been drawn from the many post-colonial experiments with cooperation. Laidlaw notes that "most observers would say that the performance of cooperatives has

been disappointing [or even] ... a failure" (Laidlaw AF, 1978, p 51). Like- wise, Newiger declares that "cooperative performance in many devel- oping countries leaves much to be desired" (Newiger NI 1983, p 37). Others have noted "a disconcertingly wide gap between expectations and achievements" (Puri SS, 1979, p 3), or even argue that rural cooperatives "aggravate dependence at the local level, rather than [encouraging] self- reliance" (Verhagen K, 1984, p 181). Such conclusions won quite a few supporters in the late 1970s and the critique may be summarized in the words of a very influential UNRISD-report:

rural cooperatives have seldom achieved the development goals set for them by economic and social planners. This has been most clearly evident when the goals have included structural changes (UNRISD, 1975, p 10).

The critique of cooperatives has, thus, been massive. Such generalizing statements do, however, not reveal much about the factors behind the real or alleged shortcomings of cooperatives as instruments for development. A closer look at the complaints most frequently mentioned is therefore needed. As with expectations, shortcomings are interrelated but for analytic clarity they will be discussed here under the following headings:

- Cooperatives bring no structural change. - Cooperatives do not benefit the poor. - Cooperatives suffer from bad management. - Cooperatives are exhausted by government interference.

Coqeratives Bring no Structural Change

Rural cooperatives in developing countries have not only been expected to fulfil the objectives of spreading organizational, attitudinal and economic innovations. They have often been assigned social objectives as well. The UNRISD-studies, which based their investigations on the stated goals of 40 cooperative organizations in 10 developing countries (UNRISD, 1975; see also Apthorpe R & Gasper D, 1982), found that

Among the ideals associated with the cooperative movement has been the aim that class distinctions among members should be eliminated or at least greatly reduced and that the cooperative should promote egalitarianism with regard to the means of production and with regard to income and benefits (UNRISD, 1975, p 6).

Equality, or the promotion of egalitarianism, are, as we have seen, not mentioned among the cooperative principles. Rather, equity, is a basic cooperative principle. However, both a good number of Western cooperative 'idealists' and many vaguely socialist regimes in the Third World have frequently assumed that cooperation would constitute a

means to reduce social stratification-or to impede its emergence in a Gemeinshaft society that was reckoned to be egalitarian.

Contrary to expectations, it has frequently been found that cooperative societies are led or controlled by members of local elites able to exploit the widening access to markets and sources of technical innovations for their own benefit. This way, it is said, better-off farmers and local notables become influential patrons to whom many are tied in informal clientage (Young C et al. 1981, p 23). Similarly, it is argued that the domination of cooperatives by large farmers "enabled them to build up networks of patronage" (Worsley P, 1984, p 148). Unavoidably,

formation of credit-groups involving tribal chiefs has often resulted in the credit going largely to the various members of the chief's clans, and relatively little to small farmers (Lele U, 1978, p 43).

But it can hardly be correct to claim that patronage networks were created by the establishment of rural cooperatives. On the contrary, patron-client relations generally characterized social structures in 'traditional' Third World rural settlements long before cooperatives were introduced. Consequently, rather than causing the emergence of patronage networks, a better conclusion is that cooperatives often have been incorporated into already existing social structures (see Kirsch 0 et al. 1980; Gyllstrom B, 1988).

An important aspect of development has been the state's role as provider, i.a. through the use of cooperatives, of the material means for development (credit, inputs, marketing). In the rural community, development establishes new contacts with, and links to, the outside world. Access to these linkages will unavoidably be unequal. Local chiefs, shaykhs and other notables appropriate-or are given-the roles as bro- kers/intermediaries between local communities and the outside world in general, and with the government in particular. In these roles they come to function as gate-keepers and factional struggles in cooperative boards and committees are not uncommon. No wonder, it is "extremely difficult for central governments to make use of these rural cooperatives for planned social change" (Hyden G & Karanja E, 1970, p 218), especially when considering the frequently noted image of governments in the Third World as "a body providing services and not as one mobilizing [people] to change" (Mabogunje A, 1980, p 268). To blame this on peasant mentality or on 'inedequate' village social structures is, however, to miss the point. There should be no wonder if government supervised cooperatives have not been able to change such structures. After all, more often than not, the state, positioned at the top of a nationwide 'delivery system', has presented itself just as a provider of material goods (see below).

Furthermore, it is likely that the need to uphold clientalist networks is enhanced during 'modernization' when formerly isolated, peripheral

communities are increasingly being linked to a wider economy. That is, at least for an initial period, and at least for the most vulnerable segments of the population, it is likely that the need to maintain these networks will be enhanced by 'development1. Even if patron/client relations are unequal and doubtless serve as instruments for domination and exploitation, they also contain reciprocal elements serving to guarantee the poor peoples' survival also in bad years. Thus, it has been noted that "small farmers tend to look upwards rather than sideways for co-operation" (Verhagen K, 1984, p 177). On the other hand, while local patrons are able to exploit the linkages to the outside world, they are also increasingly being tied to the 'modern' monetized, market oriented economy and, subsequently, become less dependent on the need to maintain patronage networks. Eventually, they find that the costs of maintaining positions as local patrons become too high, and they fail to fulfil their traditional roles (ibid.). This would force their former dependants to search for other (horizontal) ways to attain social security and to organize economic activities. In this vacuum cooperatives may very well evolve from below as genuine self-help organizations.

Thus, we may conclude that much of the disappointment with cooperative performance as instruments aiming to change social structures has been caused not by the cooperative mode of organization per se, but by the fact that cooperatives have been introduced both from outside and too early, i.e. before peripheral communities were effectively linked to a wider economy and before traditional social structures were sufficiently undermined. Therefore, due to the way they were introduced, these cooperatives have contributed to the perpetuation of the very structures identified as obstacles to the development of genuine cooperative organizations.

In order to accomplish development, a more realistic task for the state would be to concentrate on the building of necessary collective infra- structure (irrigation systems, schools, roads, etc.), thereby facilitating the spread of ideas, contacts, market relations and incentives for moderni- zation, instead of trying to tie peripheral areas to the national centre through distribution of assets and inputs that can (are likely to) be privately monopolized. In any case, to blame cooperatives for not resulting in social, structural change is to ask too much of them. As noted:

It is not realistic to believe that cooperative societies are capable of creating the preconditions for their own development (Miinkner HH, 1976, p 14).

But once these preconditions are present, establishing self-reliant, local cooperative societies may be viable measures for small peasants with common needs and ambitions to respond to, and eventually to influence the direction of, structural changes which are already under way.

Co~peratives do not Benefit the Poor

A matter closely related to that discussed above concerns the relation between cooperatives and the poor. Above we have seen that cooperatives frequently have been assumed to be the poor peoples' organizations. Consequently, the bulk of criticism of cooperative performance has centred around the redistributive effects of cooperatives. Not only has it been noted that where cooperative enterprises are economically efficient, they still "do not involve or serve a large majority of the rural poor" (Newiger NI 1983, p 39), but also that they "bring little or no benefit to the masses of poor inhabitants" (UNRISD, 1975, pix).

There is no need to doubt such observations, but the expectation that cooperatives should (mainly) benefit the poor, or even that the objective of cooperation (primarily) is to serve the poor rural population is a false assumption. As shown above, this objective is neither mentioned among the basic cooperative principles, nor is it mentioned in ILO's more relaxed definition of cooperatives, and for good reasons. In order to cooperate, you must have something to pool, and most of the Third World's rural poor have not.

In order to clarify this misunderstanding, Munkne